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I was so sure there was gonna be a crazy twist in San Junipero where the servers glitched out and turned their utopia into a hosed up hellscape or one of them was either way younger or way older than the other IRL. Glad my predictions didn't come true, the actual ending was much better.
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Oct 23, 2016 04:40
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In San Junipero when Kelly gets her five minutes with Yorkie before Yorkie dies and uses it to ask her to marry her instead it made be bust out them tears. That was probably the best episode of television I've seen all year - although Rectify hasn't started up yet to challenge it
Brodeurs Nanny fucked around with this message at 04:49 on Oct 23, 2016 |
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Oct 23, 2016 04:46
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Men Against Fire: Hated it. I hate terrible writing of military characters written by someone whose only military experience has been watching Starship Troopers. It's not that I think it's hard to write military fiction, but it's really easy to fall on tired cliches and make it all feel so fake. Everyone else has hit on the twist being revealed too soon and dragged on too long. I'll throw in that the main female character was a terrible actor, just the worst they've had on Black Mirror.
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Oct 23, 2016 05:15
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San Junipero was the best. Hatred in the Nation was just completely ridiculous. Man on Fire was heavyhanded, but effective. It basically turned into Avatar towards the end though. Shut Up and Dance was your obligatory "We're all hosed" episode Nosedive was too on the nose. Playtest was basically a dream within a dream episode from almost literally any genre show.
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Oct 23, 2016 05:15
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BJPaskoff posted:I'll throw in that the main female character was a terrible actor, just the worst they've had on Black Mirror. That's Madeline Brewer, who plays Tricia Miller in Orange in the New Black. Her performance may have been lacking in nuance for Black Mirror, but if it was, blame the Director; she is actually quite good.
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Oct 23, 2016 05:20
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In Hated in the Nation, to me it felt like a more social media aware spin on Death Note than anything. I did like the ending where they left it open ended not showing Blue confronting Garrett It does make me want to see Kelly Macdonald and Faye Marsay do a British police procedural now. Gugu Mbatha-Raw & Mackenzie Davis were really good in San Junipero. Technically, Brooker didn't write Nosedive, but it was adapted from something he wrote by Rashida Jones and Michael Schur, one of the guys who came up with Brooklyn Nine-Nine. I agree that Shut Up and Dance is very similar to White Bear where they humanize the main character while leaving little tidbits that show the gravity of what the character did, but in White Bear what was essentially the narrator had to explain it to you since it was all symbolism. Seriously, that part where Jerome Flynn's character is practically smacking him to get him to stick up the bank and then he pisses himself, jesus.
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Oct 23, 2016 05:25
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Bicyclops posted:That's Madeline Brewer, who plays Tricia Miller in Orange in the New Black. Her performance may have been lacking in nuance for Black Mirror, but if it was, blame the Director; she is actually quite good. I greatly enjoy OitNB, but the acting on the show isn't one of its better qualities.
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Oct 23, 2016 05:33
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Tatsujin posted:Technically, Brooker didn't write Nosedive, but it was adapted from something he wrote by Rashida Jones and Michael Schur, one of the guys who came up with Brooklyn Nine-Nine.
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Oct 23, 2016 07:07
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BJPaskoff posted:Men Against Fire: Hated it. I hate terrible writing of military characters written by someone whose only military experience has been watching Starship Troopers. It's not that I think it's hard to write military fiction, but it's really easy to fall on tired cliches and make it all feel so fake. Everyone else has hit on the twist being revealed too soon and dragged on too long. I'll throw in that the main female character was a terrible actor, just the worst they've had on Black Mirror. I am not military but it did feel klutzy even to me. The way they spent all this time planning/covering the house and basically it came down to one guy alone dealing with like 4 of them alone, and they let a bunch scurry out. They also did a bang up job searching the guy who owned the house. Starship Troopers acting puts it pretty well, with the lead and psychiatrist being a significant cut above the rest. Nitpicking aside, I liked the idea of super dehumanizing the enemy, there were nice subtle touches like another goon mentioned how villagers hated the people without mind altering implants. The Michael Kelly (who was good) scenes were a little too on the nose. "Hey let me explain to you the horrible secret behind everything..." I said it before, but I would have just made them refugees, and made everyone on edge because climate change was making life shittier in general. Even with all of those issues I didn't mind it.
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Oct 23, 2016 07:15
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They never really explained what the "boomer" grenade was for either, despite giving it a cool CGI spotlight
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Oct 23, 2016 07:23
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Tatsujin, you mind being a little more careful with the spoilers? I still haven't seen Hated in the Nation yet  Men Against Fire is crazy over-obvious but I did like it once the twist is actually revealed. I feel the same as whoever said the subject appeals to them even if it is portrayed in a heavy-handed manner. It's an important topic and I'm glad it got its day in this season without going uber-political.
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Oct 23, 2016 09:09
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After watching Kelly Macdonald in Hated In The Nation, I feel like that if there was a film adaptation of Gibson's Spook Country and Zero History - she would make for a perfect Hollis Henry.
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Oct 23, 2016 09:25
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Just some thoughts on St Junipero, which was rolling around in my head all day There are hundreds of ways they could have made that story end absolutely horribly. It would have been really really easy to do it any number of ways. I thought for sure either Kelly would refuse to stay, leaving Frankie alone forever in a town constantly celebrating knowing that the only person she had ever loved would never arrive, or that there would be some kind of irreconcilable issue between them that meant they had to spend eternity hating each other. Such a good episode though, maybe even worth having Heaven is a Place on Earth stuck in my head for loving hours.
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Oct 23, 2016 09:28
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Tatsujin posted:It does make me want to see Kelly Macdonald and Faye Marsay do a British police procedural now. This is great. I loved Kelly's quips throughout it.
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Oct 23, 2016 09:30
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Yes please respect Mike Schur's greater industry accomplishments, namely playing Mose SchruteBicyclops posted:Have any of the people saying this ever seen an episode of RTD Doctor Who? There are legitimate complaints about it, but this comparison keeps coming up and it's really weird. There is nothing, not the production value, not the writing, not the pacing, not the high concept or plot that in any way, shape or form resemble Davies Who, which is all about sci fi that may as well be magic, has soaring, bombastc, Murray Gold soundtracks to round out its "Not so fast, you villain!" bombastic speeches, and trundles along so fast it rarely dwells on the beats. Just about the only similarity is the over-the-top way some of the authority figures are drawn, such that we are immediately supposed to write them off as selfish power climbers that we love to hate, but that's extremely common in a lot of British sci-fi, and, even in that respect, way more similar to the last two seasons of Torchwood than Doctor Who anyway. You're right about Hated in the Nation. After going over it, I see more similarity in Men Against Fire, which features a generic multi-national military force, a council estate doubling as something more exotic, POV shots in lieu of SFX, and a sonic screwdriver. Frankly I wasn't much of a fan of either episode; San Junipero and Shut Up and Dance were the standouts for me, with Nosedive being quite good as well, and Playtest being terrible. To the other goon who quoted my Playtest comments: Part of why I (a cis-white poor-geois myself) disliked Cooper's character so much is that he's an unconventional Black Mirror protagonist. The only other white dudes headlining an episode this year are Bronn and a teenage pedo, with three episodes about women and one about a black man. Part of why I enjoy Black Mirror is how easily relatable its characters are, who are often either unlike me or put into a totally foreign situation. Take San Junipero, which uses both of those ideas to incredible effect. So, to have a suburban NY loser with mommy issues show up, was disappointing in the first place. The stereotype of the Westerner who goes travelling to "discover themself" is well-established, and reiterating it here took up an unnecessary amount of time in the episode. I like the comment that Cooper came off as an LPer, because that helps me understand the purpose of his constant smarmy comments. Not to sperg too much, but I'd imagine 9/10 Black Mirror viewers know that Dumbledore doesn't assign you your house. So here we have an uninteresting, actively offensive protagonist. My other problem with the episode was how strongly it seemed to moralize. The conceit of the AR haunted house was played well, but it doesn't seem to be the core of the story after the two fakeouts. At the end we learn Cooper was killed when a call from his mother interrupted the tester signal. None of his actions or experiences in there really mattered. Instead, he is immediately betrayed by his greed (in using his phone to immediately betray his employer) and his cowardice (in refusing to touch the open wound of his relationship with his mother). Imagine being Cooper's mother. After losing your husband to a prolonged, painful disease, your son vanishes as well. Your son could be dead as well, and you might never know! While this episode seemed similar to White Bear, Shut Up and Dance, or The National Anthem, there was nothing in this episode that indicted myself as a viewer for cheering Cooper's inevitable mutilation/death. Mameluke fucked around with this message at 09:55 on Oct 23, 2016 |
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Oct 23, 2016 09:52
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Are you calling the protagonist "actively offensive" because he gets something about Harry Potter wrong?
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Oct 23, 2016 09:54
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Short answer: yes. In a single hour of drama there's only so many things one can learn about a person. The clueless Dumbledore line is a good example, and actually a pretty decent microcosm of his character. He seems willing to engage in anything despite lacking any understanding of how it works. As far as what makes him offensive, I also mentioned his immediate willingness to betray the first company willing to pay for his plane ticket home, his emotional immaturity, and his self-absorption. He really isn't presented as having any good qualities. edit: There are also a couple parallels between this episode and Shut Up and Dance, including the recurring phonecalls from Mom and the "descent into hell" vibe both episodes generate, which calls into question why a scene where Cooper talks to a stranger's child was included. Mameluke fucked around with this message at 10:07 on Oct 23, 2016 |
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Oct 23, 2016 10:02
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I'm pretty sure he was supposed to be an annoying LP character. edit. Not that that makes him likeable, I just thought that was what they were going for, a shallow gametester.
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Oct 23, 2016 10:04
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Playtest Calling mom seems like it wouldn't do much. Cooper contests the validity of everything except for the fact his mother can not recognize him in any way and is compelled to call him futilely. So I believe that's how the situation is in the real world.
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Oct 23, 2016 10:34
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Nosedive felt like Black Mirror but made for retards, I wanted to like it but by the end of the episode just completely hated it. The reest of the season was really enjoyable thankfully, but Shut Up and Dance was the only episode that really clicked with me. I think they would have been better served by just sticking to three episodes instead of doing six, episodes like Men Against Fire have a really good core idea and just needed a little more work.
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Oct 23, 2016 10:46
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So much bitching about Playtest's character instead of the fact that it's the lamest dream within a dream within a dream payoff ever. I actually enjoyed the characterisation during the 1st half hour and thought it was clever that they emphasised the 0.4s duration of the test before he went into shock, until you think about it ... that means that meeting the Japanese director was made up in his mind, as well as all the interactions with the woman, the Edgar Allan Poe novel, all the rules of the haunted house... so much stuff (SO MUCH STUFF) happens after he gets plugged in that simply do not belong in his 'mind'. How the gently caress do you go from gophers to an haunted house concept from this dude's POV. He just returned from a trip around the world, and that's where his mind goes? American Horror Story tropes? That's quite self indulgent. It's a great premise, they push it very very far, and gently caress up the ending. Too bad because I really liked the idea of him actually getting alzheimer's during the game and coming back having lost most of his memory and motor skills - sounds much more bittersweet and black-mirror-y, and whats worst is that they actually go there and decide for a much worse layer (he died before anything actually happened- what the gently caress?), throwing that one in the trash. With that said I must thank the thread for helping me figure out how Shut Up and Dance was this year's White Bear, it didnt click with me because I feel asleep halfway and forgot the kid's toy scene, thought the blackmailer was just being a piece of poo poo.
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Oct 23, 2016 10:50
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How do you gently caress up Hideo Kojima's Black Mirror?
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Oct 23, 2016 10:57
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I'm not familiar with UK's government, who were the people hearing the testimony supposed to be? All the dudes were knighted.
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Oct 23, 2016 11:02
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im gay posted:I'm not familiar with UK's government, who were the people hearing the testimony supposed to be? All the dudes were knighted. I'd say it's MI5 as they're in suits and not anything a Judge would wear, the higher ups do tend to be Knighted in MI5.
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Oct 23, 2016 11:52
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White Rabbit posted:So much bitching about Playtest's character instead of the fact that it's the lamest dream within a dream within a dream payoff ever. Playtest: The company was known for creating a series of horror games (which IIRC he said he had played before), and he saw the haunted house on one of the game designers' screens (Though now that I think about it, I'm not sure if that scene happened before or after the "glitch")
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Oct 23, 2016 13:03
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Playtest the fact that he was only jacked in for 0.04 seconds blew me the gently caress away, loved it overall.
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Oct 23, 2016 13:07
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AEMINAL posted:Playtest the fact that he was only jacked in for 0.04 seconds blew me the gently caress away, loved it overall. Playtest: I like the ambiguity about exactly how much of his dream was designed by the brain interface AI. Did the cell phone signal just mess up the interface and cause it to activate all his neurons at once, and then dream is just how his mind made sense of that activation by drawing on all recent knowledge and his imagination? Or did the AI come up with a horror story in less than 0.04 seconds that hit all of his fears and anxieties, and deliberately capped it off with his dread of the very thing that just happened in the real world, with braindead just being a sideeffect of the intensity? The talk with the CEO at the end imply that cell phones ringing during the test is not normal, but that people dying is. So perhaps the call was entirely without blame and just something the AI wove into the story for drama.
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Oct 23, 2016 13:28
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im just three minutes into the new season and already very uncomfortable
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Oct 23, 2016 13:43
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5 minutes into Playtest, and I remember how much I loving hate backpackers.
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Oct 23, 2016 14:37
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Nosedive felt like a brutal punch to the gut that kept going. Bryce Dallas Howard knocked it out the drat park, I liked the creeping tension, the final catharsis, all fully and well realized. A high bar to set with episode 1 of season 3, can't wait for the rest.
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Oct 23, 2016 14:55
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Mameluke posted:Short answer: yes. I'm pretty sure all this endless shite written about this character in this thread is more just people trying to come up with verbose ways of saying "hes annoying".
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Oct 23, 2016 15:01
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TheRationalRedditor posted:Regarding "Men Against Fire", it isn't exactly based on a revolutionary premise, but I feel like I saw a high-production value digital short on vimeo or youtube a few years ago that had the exact same twist and reveal. Anyone else know what I'm referring to or remember its name? Well, the movie "The 5th Wave" has a similar technical twist/premise, except for the eugenics aspect, if I remember correctly. It's aliens in the movie. It's a bad movie.
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Oct 23, 2016 15:26
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Shut Up and Dance, christ
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Oct 23, 2016 15:30
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WE B Boo-ourgeois posted:Shut Up and Dance, christ I think what makes Shut Up and Dance so powerful to me is that it's absolutely current. Episodes like 15 Million Merits and White Bear hit hard but there's still a very clear disconnect between their worlds and the reality of the present. But this story is something that could literally be happening today. It's not a story that warns us of how poo poo the future could be, it's one that shows us how poo poo the world is now.
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Oct 23, 2016 15:41
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Playtest: I feel like you guys are being too hard on Cooper. I am not a fan of his character trope either but it felt like he was just desperately trying to make some cool memories after watching his Father slowly die while losing all of his. It wasn't some kind of hippy 'finding myself' trip, it was a reaction to his grief and fear. Avoiding his mother who only reminded him about his loss was a pretty natural reaction to that.
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Oct 23, 2016 15:54
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its cool that people all over are already way on board w/ the events of shut up
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Oct 23, 2016 16:00
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Nosedive was great. Had reservations from the first few minutes but it actually has a point to make beyond the blindingly obvious. Definitely enthused about the rest now. Gonna try and pace myself though.
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Oct 23, 2016 17:02
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dangerdoom volvo posted:its cool that people all over are already way on board w/ the events of shut up we already had some sociopath on board with white bear itt so it's hardly surprising
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Oct 23, 2016 17:20
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Well that second episode was something alright. a bit1408 but with VR rather than ghosts. Also somebody literally died from too much phones. Anyway, much less of a "oh my goodness everything in the setting of that episode was hosed up" so I think I'll watch another later maybe. I like that sometimes it's just a contained story.
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Oct 23, 2016 18:52
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Just started watching the first episode of season 3. Just five minutes in and it's already awkward as gently caress. 
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Oct 23, 2016 18:59
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